Wireless communications systems are evolving to provide enhanced data services, such as portable wireless access to the Internet and other data services, including broadband services, to wireless users. However, as the number of users in such systems grows, the number of resources, and in particular, communication channels that are available, typically become increasingly scarce. For instance, in a mobile wireless communication system, the number of wireless communication channels (e.g., frequency, time, space, and/or code channels) that a particular base station can support for exchanging data or voice information with a remote mobile or stationary user terminal in a given geographical area is finite and limited. As such, if all users access the resources of a wireless communication to begin, for example, a data exchange session at the same time, over-contention may occur, resulting in network inefficiency (e.g., wasted bandwidth), relatively low per-user bandwidth and/or relatively high per-user latency.
Therefore, it is desirable to provide a method and apparatus that enables management of resources, such as channels available for wireless communication, to prevent the above-described and other drawbacks with prior systems.